Consortium for the Assessment of College Equivalency (CACE)

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The Consortium for the Assessment of College Equivalency facilitates degree completion of adult learners by developing new pathways of cooperation among adult-centered colleges and universities regarding reviews of college-equivalent learning from organized, structured learning experiences not sponsored by an accredited college or university, including the promotion of rigorous common standards.

Founding Members

Charter Oak State College

Excelsior College

SUNY Empire State College

Community College of Vermont

Granite State College

Thomas Edison State University

Each an innovator in the recognition of college-level learning from non-collegiate settings, the six founding members of CACE have developed an agreement to increase the availability of credit to their students and establish standards for the review and recommendation of credit by individual campuses.

Forming a Consortium

The founding member institutions all were established as part of an educational movement in the 1970’s that recognized the specific needs of adult learners. These colleges have worked to fulfill and expand their mission over the years, each developing its own set of policies and practices tailored to increase their adult students’ access to higher education and success in completing their degrees . Since students have experienced variations in the process of having their credits evaluated and in the amount of credit that has been awarded by different institutions, CACE seeks to provide consistency in these credit evaluations by articulating institutional assessment standards and allowing the institutions to share resources and information about their reviews.

CACE intends to create a mechanism for the partner institutions to share information from credit recommendations they have developed for such Non-Collegiate Instruction in order to allow all partners to award the recommended credit directly based on official documentation of successful completion, without the need to transfer the credits from the reviewing institution.

CACE Standards

CACE developed a set of Standards for the Assessment of Non-Collegiate Instruction (PDF) to guide educational institutions in the evaluation of college-level learning and competencies delivered and/or verified through organized, structured learning experiences not sponsored for credit by an accredited college or university. These standards are grouped into evaluator administrative standards, the relationship between the evaluator and sponsor, learning experience oversight, and the components of a review. By following the CACE Standards, educational institutions will have the tools to more consistently acknowledge college-level learning accomplished outside of a college classroom and increase portability of those credits for learners.